Will FUSE be the Sleeper Hit of the Year?

OnlySP: Since the time that EA announced Overstrike way back when, I’ve constantly been asking myself what reason I have to pick up this game. Over the last few months though, it’s begun to pique my interest due to it’s cooperative gameplay and creative weaponry that Insomniac is so well known for. Sadly, I think FUSE will be one of those games that garners high review scores, but low sales due to EA’s lack of marketing of the game aside from a trailer every now and then and the fan feedback of the game due to EA’s partnership with Insomniac, leading many gamers to believe it will simply be another generic shooter under the EA brand.

The coregamer that visits sites like this, alot of them are still mad about Overstrike turning into this generic tps and the other half doesnt even know the game exists, because there is absolutely no marketing from EA. They should have never folded to EA's focus group and just say bleep you EA we will find another publisher for Overstrike.

Its what Naughty dog did after a marketing firm hired by Sony didnt want Ellie on the boxart or behind Joel.

Its what Ken Levine should have done. Even after a marketing firm did research in a frat house and most of those guys said they buy games based on their boxart and they have never heard of Bioshock. Elizabeth played a bigger role in the game to me then Booker, she shouldve been part of the boxart not shoved to the back.

Sorry for my long rant. But it pisses me off that these studios and publishers think that aiming for the dudebro crowd is gonna get them a massive fanbase.

Maybe after this games bombs we will get the details behind the Overstrike to Fuse change.

Box art is part of marketing the game, so if someone is casually browsing video games in a store, their eyes will go more towards the attractive box art. Its partially why games like Sniper Ghost Warrior actually sell any descent amount of units.

The problems with this game stretch way beyond something as minor as box art (Bioshock Infinite's box art was mildly annoying, but nothing I got my panties in a twist about). Granted, I haven't actually played the game, but none of the gameplay videos I've seen of FUSE (or Overstrike) have been particularly reassuring.

I think the author is right in the fact that because of recent events at EA a good number of people will pass on the game simply because it's branded by EA.

Personally I don't really have an issue with EA, and have loved all of Insomniac's games so I'm interested in trying this one out. But EA has certainly done a horrendous job of marketing the game or even making it look that fun to begin with. I hope it does critically well, but on the financial side of things, maybe Insomniac will realize their true home is at Sony.

If a game looks generic, the publisher behind them has a history of ruining studios under them and the fact that it looked better with it's first trailer....well I think it's safe to judge. All your doing really is learning from history

I mean you'll hold it off "not to judge", hear what you'll want to hear and by that I mean listening to EA and Insomniac bulls*** you into thinking it will be good and not generic at all when all they are doing is trying to sell you the game and then you'll buy it......but then you'll see that people were right and now that you've bought it you can't do anything about it because you've already given your money to EA

If you know you can stop this cycle earlier by being a little more harsh and thinking about things logically then you won't waste your money and will stop funding greedy companies like EA and stop them ruining their studios by doing things like this.

Least then if it IS good (highly unlikely) then you can buy it after...no one will be stopping you

I just want people to see that you can judge games before they come out.

If I was to judge the Last of Us multiplayer even though I haven't seen it despite there being a great studio behind it then fair enough I shouldn't be judging too soon, but if it was someone like EA behind it I would complain without seeing it after the tacked on multiplayer in Dead Space 2 for example. Get what I mean....learning from the past, since EA is behind it and after what they did to other studios, I think FUSE will be crap - average at best

EA butchered Insomniacs original game....yeah yeah yeah I know we didn't see that much it was just a CGI trailer but that trailer give many people our first impressions on this new game which made us think "Wow...finally fun looking shooter which isn't that serious, kind of like a Pixar game in a way. This has Insomniac written all over it"

However EA came along with their "game testers" and changed it. Now it's a generic third person shooter which looks terrible and dosen't look like a game Insomniac would make

The characters styles, the humour, the designs, the plot, the name of the game even....have all been changed for the worst.

I wouldn't be bothered about it that much but the problem was that Insomniac said themselves that they moved away from Sony and refused to be bought by them because they wanted freedom and didn't want to be restricted while making games...YET they've done just that, they go with the worst publisher this gen who doesn't allow such things. I mean look what they did to Bioware, Maxis with SimCity and Visceral Games, then you have some issues about what they've done to DICE.

Want to save Insomniac from sticking with EA in the future...don't buy the game. Insomniac will then go crawling back to Sony. I'd rather have an exclusive studio then a ruined one stuck with EA.

It's hard to say, I mean games, and especially new games tend to have a hard time breaking in on old consoles when new ones have been announced. Some really great games have been ignored at the end of a cycle because people are saving for the next console and games.

Has there been a hit this year? I don't even know if a game has met expectations yet, Tomb Raider was amazing, but didn't meet expectations, God Of War and Gears Of War undersold, it's tough going right now, and we're not sure what the expected sales are supposed to be.

It doesn't look like a game I'd buy full price, maybe if it went down to $30 or so in the future.

I sure hope so.If this game is good maybe word of mouth will help it. On neogaf in a thread about the game going gold a couple of the employees were defending the game against people bashing the game for looking generic and that Overstrike was better. Insomniac switched it because the gameplay didn't work when it was overstrike and the game just wasn't fun. They also said people can't say Overstrike is better than FUSE because they never played it and I agree wih Insomniac on that. I for one plan on buying the game at launch just to support Insomniac. There will be a demo for the game so lets just wait and actually play it to see how it really is before dismissing this game as not being fun. So if the game doesn't end up being successful Insomniac can always go back to Sony

Before I judge it. I'll buy it and see what they've done. I read Game Informer and IGN's hands on and both enjoyed it. I've got a soft spot for insomniac, their last 2 good games were "A Crack In Time" and Resistance 3 made by the Burbank Ca, Studio. That North Carolina Studio that churned out those 2 pos ratchet games should be shut down.

Same here. I love Insomniac and its sad that people are not giving this game a chance. It could be really fun. I have complete in Insomnhac to deliver a great experience. Hopefully the demo that's coming our soon will change people's negative opinions

I'd say that God of War, Gears of War, DMC, Revengeance have all underperformed. Tomb Raider actually did well, but SE have some crazy targets.

I think some of the crazy big games, like GTA 5 and COD will still perform well at the end of the year - but there's a definite end of generation lethargy settling in.

I've built up quite a backlog of games this gen that I'm still to go through, do I want to add Fuse to the list? I'm not sure that I do. It'll probably end up being good, but I just don't think I'll ever get round to it.

But I do to some extent in Insomniac. I would wait for demo before I deem the game a failure. I find amusing tho, that many of the negative feedback comes from those that don't trust EA (rightfully so) or those hold a grudge against insomniac becouse them moving away from sony.

I know it's n4g. But put away the fangs cubs. Any way, I don't enjoy fairy tales on my FPS. I want it dark. But I'm surt, and too much fairy light hurts my eyes.

Box art ,no box art don't care if it comes in a plain box . I am purchasing it cause they will have all rights to the IP & their trying to be a multi-plat developer. For those reason alone is why I will buy their game.

@sway_z if they stayed at Sony they would be just plain developers with no IP of their own .

I'll still try the final game or at least a demo , but it didnt grab me when it was the colorful overstrike cgi , and certainly didnt interest me more as the "gray" generic looking but with crazy weapon tps it became .

Besides it releases with a bad timing . No way i'll pick it this close to Last of us or Remember me . And there is still persona 4 arena in may for EU .

If you read the article, not saying you didn't ha, but people made that worry known to Insomniac about the drab environments and they went back and added tons of color and made it a unique looking world.

Maybe this will help some people on this website. Because I notice that alot of people just goes off of hear say.

When there's a game that interests you, Look on youtbe for gameplay and judge for yourself. Not every game is for everyone. With that said, I was one that was more into the Overstrike idea than the Fuse idea. But I still had faith in Insomniac and I think they did a great job with Fuse. It looks great but I don't think the masses will flock to this, but It will be a great game to pick up after the price drops.